Skip to main content

FM
Former Member

Donald Trump ties his record: 37 false claims in one day

Trump made a dizzying flurry of false claims Monday, tying his record from the last presidential debate.

WASHINGTON—Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump had one of the busiest days of his campaign on Monday, Oct. 24. He did two Florida rallies, two Florida round tables, two radio interviews, an interview with Christian conservative Pat Robertson, and an interview with the Palm Beach Post newspaper.

And he said 37 false things — tying the record he set at the third presidential debate, by far the most of any nondebate day since we started counting in September. The list:

1. Falsely said of Clinton’s email deletion: “Sophisticated people, people that really know the Internet and this stuff, said they never even heard of bleaching, because it’s such an expensive process.” (Clinton aides used a software program called BleachBit — which is a free download.)

2. Falsely said, of an allegation that he violated the trade embargo with Cuba, “I mean, I’m hearing this for the first time but I’ll check that.” (Trump was asked about this very subject the day prior, and his senior aides have been asked since the story came out in September.)

3. Falsely said, “And I’ve been endorsed largely, at least conceptually, by the military.” (The military does not issue endorsements, and it is nonsensical to say he has been “conceptually” endorsed by the military. Trump has endorsements from retired officers, but so does Clinton.)

Donald Trump hugs a U.S. flag as he comes onstage to rally with supporters in Tampa, Fla., Monday,Donald Trump hugs a U.S. flag as he comes onstage to rally with supporters in Tampa, Fla., Monday,  (JONATHAN ERNST / REUTERS)

Replies sorted oldest to newest

4. Falsely said, “Wow, just came out on secret tape that Crooked Hillary wants to take in as many Syrians as possible.” (No such tape has just come out. In an undercover video by a conservative group in 2015, Clinton aide Huma Abedin benignly agrees with a provocateur’s suggestion that the U.S. should accept Syrian refugees, as Clinton has said publicly.)

5. Falsely tweeted, “Why has nobody asked Kaine about the horrible views emanated on WikiLeaks about Catholics? Media in the tank for Clinton but Trump will win!” (Democratic vice-presidential candidate Tim Kaine was asked in various interviews about Clinton aides’ comments about Catholics.)

6. Falsely said, “She got the debate questions in advance. Think of it. Did you hear this? Hillary Clinton got the debate questions in advance from Donna Brazile!” (This is false in more than one way. Clinton appears to have been given one question by Brazile, not questions plural, and it was for a CNN town hall during the Democratic primary in March, not a debate. And certainly not a general-election debate, as Trump was implying.)

7. Falsely said, “Hillary Clinton gave Russia 20 per cent of American uranium. And you know, she was paid a fortune.” (Clinton didn’t personally give Russia uranium — the State Department was one of nine government entities that endorsed the purchase of Uranium One by a Russian state-owned enterprise. Investors in the deal made big donations to the Clinton Foundation, but “at least two years before the deal,” Politifact reports. There is no evidence that Clinton personally profited at all.)

FM

8. Falsely said, “New Hampshire was my first win. Then I went on to win 42 states.” (Trump won 36 states in the Republican primary.)

9. Falsely said of the Clinton campaign, “They’ve given up in Ohio.” (They have not. Clinton and her top allies have made repeated October visits to Ohio.)

10. Falsely said of North Carolina, “In your state, I’m one point, two points and even in three polls. One point, two points and even.” (Clinton has led in at least 13 consecutive North Carolina polls.)

11. Falsely said, “All I know is we’re leading in the polls.” (Trump trails by an average of more than five points nationally.)

12. Falsely said, “The new poll that just came out from Investor’s Business Daily, which was the most accurate poll from the last three presidential elections, has us up two points nationwide.” (The IBD poll is a tracking poll that changes daily; as of the moment Trump spoke, Clinton had a 0.1 per cent lead in it. She leads by 0.8 points in it. The IBD poll was not the most accurate poll in the last election.)

FM

13. Falsely said, “Everybody had me winning the third debate.” (False. Trump lost in every scientific poll.)

14. Falsely said, “I won the last two debates, and every poll showed it.” (False. Trump lost in every scientific poll.)

15. Falsely said, “Like the ABC phony poll that just came in. Totally phony poll.” (The ABC poll is a legitimate poll.)

16. Falsely tweeted, “Major story that the Dems are making up phony polls in order to suppress the the (sic) Trump.” (This did not happen.)

17. Falsely said, “We’re way ahead in Ohio.” (Trump has a tiny lead in Ohio, 0.4 per cent in the average poll.)

18. Falsely said, “We’re leading Ohio by five or six points, we’re even in Florida, we’re leading North Carolina.” (Trump has a tiny lead in Ohio, 0.4 per cent in the average poll. He is down by an average of four points in Florida. He has trailed in 13 consecutive North Carolina polls.)

FM

19. Falsely said of polls, “When they leave them alone and do them properly, I’m leading … they’re polling Democrats.” (Pollsters are conducting legitimate polls. Trump is losing in almost all of them.)

20. Falsely said, “WikiLeaks also shows how John Podesta rigged the polls by oversampling Democrats … a voter suppression technique.” (This is one of the most comprehensively wrong sentences of the campaign. One: the hacked email in question is from 2008. Two: it is not from Podesta. Three: it was about internal polling, not public polling. Four, oversampling is a polling technique used to ensure accurate data about demographic groups, not to rig polls. Five, it is not a voter suppression technique.)

21. Falsely said, “Seventy-five per cent of the American people think our country is on the wrong track, according to all of the latest polls” and “Close to 80 per cent of the people in this country feel that our country is going in the wrong direction.” (The “wrong track” number averages 64 per cent in the polls. It has not been higher than 70 per cent in any poll for more than three months, according to RealClearPolitics.)

22. Falsely said of Syrian refugee intake, “We’re allowing thousands of people, we don’t know who they are, where they’re from, we know nothing about them.” (The refugees are put through an extensive screening process. Trump can argue that the U.S. still does not know enough about them, but it is false to say it knows nothing.)

FM

23. Falsely said, “She lies more than any human being.” (Trump lies far more frequently.)

24. Falsely said, “When Hillary Clinton was secretary of state they would catch a murderer, drug lords, gang members, violent criminals and they would bring them back to their country … Hillary Clinton was told that their country won’t take them, so she said, that’s okay bring them back, we don’t want to create waves.” (This is thoroughly incorrect. When countries won’t take back an illegal immigrant who has committed a crime, the U.S. does not deport them anyway. It was not Clinton’s choice to release them; under a 2001 Supreme Court decision, they cannot be held indefinitely.)

25. “When you hear about the highest murder rate in 45 years, there’s a lot of reasons for it.” (The increase in murders between 2014 and 2015, 11 per cent, was the highest in 45 years. But the number of murders was even lower than it was 45 years ago — even though the country had more than 100 million more people. The murder rate remains near a historic low.)

26. “Premiums are going up 70, 80, 90 per cent” and “The rates are going up 60, 70, per cent.” (Obamacare prices are jumping, but Trump greatly overstates the hikes. On the Healthcare.gov federal exchange, the benchmark premium is rising by an average of 25 per cent, the administration announced Monday. Wrote the Washington Post earlier: “State-by-state weighted average increases range from just 1.3 per cent in Rhode Island to as high as 71 per cent in Oklahoma. But the most common plans in the marketplace will see an average increase of 9 per cent, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation’s July analysis.”)

FM

27. Falsely said, of the Veterans Health Association, “In Phoenix, they had people who got caught stealing and they couldn’t fire them. They’re going through a process right now.” (The Phoenix scandal was not about theft but about wait times for care, falsified records and retribution. Though many critics say it should be easier to fire executives in such cases, and there is a legal and political battle over a law that would allow this to happen, Phoenix employees were indeed fired.)

28. Falsely said, “I’ve been endorsed by all the Border Patrol.” (Trump has been endorsed by the Border Patrol agents’ union, not its executives and not the entire entity. Trump usually specifies, but did not here.)

29. Falsely said, “WikiLeaks also shows how John Podesta … he said she has ‘bad instincts.’” (It was not Podesta but another Clinton ally, Neera Tanden, who said her instincts were “suboptimal.”)

30. Falsely described an Obamacare study: “Over two thirds of the counties are losing insurers.” (The Kaiser study found that about one third of U.S. counties will have only one insurer on Obamacare marketplaces. It did not talk about what percentage of counties had lost insurers.)

FM

31. Falsely described a campaign donation: “Listen to this — the FBI is investigating Clinton … and virtually her best friend, and absolutely closest ally, gives $675,000 in campaign contributions to the woman who’s married to the FBI person who’s doing the investigation. No wonder they found nothing wrong.” (The donation by the PAC of Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe to unsuccessful Virginia state Senate candidate Jill McCabe was made before her husband Andrew McCabe was promoted to FBI Deputy Director and before he had responsibility for the email investigation; Trump is clearly suggesting the donation was made during the investigation.)

32. Falsely said of the New York Times, “The Times is going to be out of business pretty soon.” (There is no indication this is even close to true.)

33. Falsely said of lawyer Gloria Allred, “She works for the Clinton campaign.” (Allred is a Clinton supporter who was a delegate to the Democratic convention, but she does not work for the campaign.)

34. Falsely said, of illegal immigrants committing murders, “This crime wave ends, believe me, quickly, when I am president.” (There is no evidence of a wave of crime by illegal immigrants. Studies suggest that immigrants are less likely to commit crimes, not more.)

FM

35. Falsely said, “We’re giving you massive tax relief for the middle class.” (Experts say the overwhelming majority of Trump’s cuts will go to the rich. Half are for the top 1 per cent, according to the Tax Policy Center, and some middle-class families will pay even more than they do now. Most families below the top 20 per cent of earners are expected to reap income gains of less than 1 per cent.)

36. Falsely said, “Hillary Clinton is going to raise your taxes substantially.” (Clinton is only raising taxes on the highest earners. The Tax Policy Center says most residents below the top 1 per cent will receive minor tax cuts under her plan, and even most of the highest earners will not see a doubling.)

37. Falsely said, of Clinton’s abortion views, “a day prior to birth you can take that baby.” (Abortions are not performed a day prior to birth, doctors say.)

FM

Add Reply

×
×
×
×
×
Link copied to your clipboard.
×
×